Paper short abstract:

We present our experience in bridging gap between computational social science and the open science philosophy in the form of “pop-up experiments.” These are non-permanent, highly participatory collective experiments which transform the experiments into experiences aiming to propose civic actions.

Paper long abstract:

Citizen Science can furnish ready-made solutions with citizens playing an active role. However, this framework is still far from being well established as a standard tool for computational social science research. Here, we present our experience in bridging gap between computational social science and the philosophy underlying Open Science, which in our case has taken the form of what we call "pop-up experiments." These are non-permanent, highly participatory collective experiments which blend features developed by big data methodologies and behavioral experimental protocols with the ideals of Citizen Science. The main issues to take into account whenever planning experiments of this type are classified, discussed and grouped into three categories: infrastructure, public engagement, and the knowledge return for citizens. We explain the solutions we have implemented, providing practical examples grounded in our own experience in an urban context (Barcelona, Spain). Our aim here is that this work will serve as a guideline for groups willing to adopt and expand such in vivo practices and we hope it opens up the debate regarding the possibilities (and also the limitations) that the Citizen Science and Open Science frameworks can offer the study of social phenomena. Morevorer, experiments are in this way transformed into experiences aiming to propose civic actions based on evidences gathered in a collective and transparent manner.

Reference: Sagarra O, Gutiérrez-Roig M, Bonhoure I and Perelló J (2016) Citizen Science Practices for Computational Social Science Research: The Conceptualization of Pop-Up Experiments. Front. Phys. 3:93. doi: 10.3389/fphy.2015.00093